Equitable, excellent, empowering: Innovative TVET in hospitality

This hybrid Learning Lab will take place on 24 April 2024 from 9:00 to 11:15 CEST (14:00 to 16:15 ICT).

Equitable, excellent, empowering: Innovative TVET in hospitality

Fostering inclusive and diverse Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) environments is essential to ensuring that all individuals are allotted equal educational opportunities. Inclusion in education has a ripple effect leading to better individual economic outcomes, labour market stability and overall improved societal cohesion.

But how do we create inclusive settings, ones based on holistic approaches that extend beyond the classroom? Moreover, in which ways can inclusive TVET programmes prepare their students for structural changes in both regional and global economies?

Taking two examples from the hospitality sector, this BILT Learning Lab aims to delve into these questions and many more.

Know One, Teach One, Vietnam

Know One, Teach One (KOTO) started in 1999 as a small hospitality training centre in Hanoi, aspiring to create better lives for at-risk and disadvantaged youth. Since then, this non-profit social enterprise has expanded not only its programme offerings and training facilities, but also internationally.

The programmes are free and provide full accommodation, health care and welfare support to participants. Staying true to its principles of offering opportunities and empowerment to all, in 2018 the Her Turn initiative was born with support from Australian aid.

Promoting female economic empowerment through TVET, Her Turn focuses on marginalized individuals from regional areas and ethnic minority groups. Vietnamese women within this grouping often have limited formal education and lack valuable life skills, making them vulnerable to disenfranchisement, exploitation and trafficking.

Through short course skills training, a long-term career development programme and a learnership building programme in the hospitality sector, Her Turn is working to establish opportunities for women. The project focuses heavily on instilling entrepreneurial skills and career development for female empowerment.

Cometa Società Cooperativa Sociale. Italy

Concerns over youth unemployment and inclusion through TVET are not exclusive to Asian countries, but in-fact present challenges globally. Beginning in 1986, La Cometa Società Cooperativa Sociale (COMETA) has a long history of supporting disadvantaged youth populations in Italy.

Officially, the Associazione Cometa was first founded in 2000 and began its first TVET training courses with the establishment of the Cometa Formazione institution in 2003. Similar to KOTO, COMETA has continued to grow and expand itself offering unique projects and initiatives based on the current needs of the communities it serves.

In 2010, when Italian youth unemployment rates stood at 27.9 percent, COMETA looked for a way to reach out to young adults, migrant minors and asylum seekers. As a result of legal, linguistic and sociocultural differences, recent migrants are susceptible to educational and economic marginalization.

With this background in mind, the MiniMaster initiative was created. The MiniMaster is a holistic training programme in waitstaff and housekeeping, which is tailored to the local job market. In addition to professional skills, transversal and cultural skills development are cornerstones of the training. The programme goes a step further by providing individual support to each participant through a Human Integral Development approach.

Both initiatives collaborate closely with industry partners to ensure the success of participants and local businesses. Through initiatives, like MiniMaster and Her Turn, TVET providers are working to dismantle barriers and establish pathways for disadvantage groups to succeed.

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